ANOTHER VENDOR SPYS ME OUT - updates only via impluse :-(

i am very disapointed and angry regarding this new policy of distributing patches ONLY via impulse!! In the future we need one installation per vendor in order to protect our privacy any more. Users with small internet uplinks are not in the focus of this Stardock anymore?

i am very disapointed and angry regarding this new policy of distributing patches ONLY via impulse!! In the future we need one installation per vendor in order to protect our privacy any more. Users with small internet uplinks are not in the focus of this Stardock anymore?

An angry customer.

Impulse reduces the average download size from 700 megs to around 10 megs. I would say that's a good thing for the user with a small internet uplink.

i can´t logon for playing online anymore. As far as i red here around, i ll need the new patch. To gather a game patch i have to download and install a kind of software which i don´t trust. I ´ ll accept a registration in order to receive updates, but not a kind of software which is a damn DRM system. If the vendor changes his strategy or being busted your lost. I didn bought Half-Life cause of Steam - i ll hate this stuff. Collecting only privacy data, without any kind of alternatives. Why the hell are those patches only via impulse available?

By the way, it doesnt work After logon to impluse, it crashes. F***** I ll really appreciate this new feature .

Stardock FORCES me to use a kind of Software in order to update my bought games? WHY??? Where is the privacy statement, who knows what kind of data collection is done in the background. If i am forced to do so, it is the first step towards DRM - nothing more! Add online control like steam and ur in business.... remeber i´ve been forced.

If it would be an option, besides the rock-solid download patches it has not that taste...and why are customers forced?

psychoack - who says i am using autoupdate, uh? , by the way there are offline repositories available.

Why do I get the feeling the majory of the most, ah... vocal segment of the community that hates impulse are ones that haven't bought the game and therefore cannot update?

I know literally dozens of people who have Impulse and I've never seen one with a major problem with it.

No, there are some legitimate issues that we're dealing with but they're very specific cases.

First, you have the people who, for whatever reason, had trouble with the InstallAware web downloader we used to install Impulse in the first place. That's a big chunk of the people. We fixed that by making a new full install that's only 8 or so megs.

Second, you have a group of people whose timeclock, for whatever reason, isn't synced with ours and so the security check is barfing. Again, it's not Impulse. Even if we had a pure stand alone patch you can bet we would have at least used an SSL download server. We should have that somewhat addressed shortly.

Third, you have a group who do not have an Internet connection on their home computer that they use Sins on and you cannot install updates without an Internet connection on the machine to validate the user's account. We are addressing this by placing the user account info into the archive so someone could use a third party computer to download the update and then move it to their home computer.

Fourth, there are just people who have strange issues. Maybe they don't have .NET, maybe they have some other issue that we don't know about.

But yea, there are the much larger groups of people that fall into either the category of crank (and yes, I'm saying crank, as CEO of Stardock, I think having Impulse turn away obnoxious cranks from ever ever ever buying something we develop or publish is a feature) who object to Impulse purely on some strange principle. As if downloading an 8 megabyte download updater that lets them get updates vastly faster is somehow the end of the world.

And there's the even larger group of warez users who are bummed they can't go to File Planet or whatever and simply download it and thus have to wait until some torrent or whatever shows up.

Ironically, Impulse isn't an anti-piracy solution. It's just a very smart, very cool digital distribution client for minimizing download times through a combination of only giving you what you need and getting it from the fastest, closest server in the world.

Stardock requring you to be registered to download a patch and requring a front end like Impulse to apply it is certainly more inconvenient than not having to register nor having to use a front end to download a patch, this is obvious.

But the flip side of this is you don't need to [further] register to play, nor have the front end running, nor have a CD in the drive, nor look for a no-cd .exe.

Perhaps you equate Impulse (and its required .NET framework...another complex issue) with secuROM? As in software being there for the betterment of the seller, rather than the buyer. Any leash, no matter how long is still a leash and this gets you riled up. I can see why, as I agree.

Maybe Frogboy will further explain his thinking for us, it's not like he keeps secrets about his intentions and it's not like he disrespects gamers, and he's certainly no fool but he is busy and it's a complex (read: $$$) subject.

Interesting info, Frogboy! Just to clarify, my statement was that I believe the majority of the most vocal segment of the "I Hate Impulse!" crowd are the warez kiddies. I don't doubt that there are legitimate issues that arise, otherwise there'd be no need for a tech supportstaff

Interesting info, Frogboy! Just to clarify, my statement was that I believe the majority of the most vocal segment of the "I Hate Impulse!" crowd are the warez kiddies. I don't doubt that there are legitimate issues that arise, otherwise there'd be no need for a tech support staff

I have HughesNet satellite internet at home, and Impluse works like a dream. I've never had issue with it. I LOVE it. I can install it, log in wiht my acount, and poof...there are the games I have purchased waiting for me to install. Makes it great when you upgrade to new machines. The updater is really great too. Since it only pulls down the files I need, my update time is cut way down. Less time downloading means more time to play. That means a lot when you don't have all that much free time to begin with. I LOVE Impulse.

I have to agree. It definately seems like many of the most vocal appear on paper as playing unlicensed copies.

It's also funny how people say they are forced to use impulse. Nobody is making you play the game or using impulse or even using your operating system. Nobody is forcing you to update your copy of Sins. Being as irate as some of these people are, it's counter productive. I for one think a bulk of these "i want a standalone patch" never bought the game. If i'm homeless am I gonna complain because i can't get my subscription to juggs because I have no physical address? Digital distribution is here and now. Deal with it. We live in the computer AGE. If you don't have an internet connection then perhaps move in to year 2008 with the rest of us and get a connection. We all should know how to find and go through proper channels for tech support. Frankly some of you guys are more irate than your typical securom ranter and I'm sure none of you want that.

People need to learn how to resolve problems properly. If i had a problem with Sins/impulse, i would shut up and take the medicine that mommy prescribed and stop complaining. Closed mouth gathers no foot as they say.

I ll understand the idea behind impulse in order to control the "legal" installed "fleet" out there. This is a kind of DRM system. On the other hand side, i am playing 95% online and 5% on the lan with my friends (if we find time).

I ll hate it to being forced by anything and one - may my paranioa - being foreign controld what happens on my pc.

To play online you need a valid license - this is for what this game was build. A patch application wont bring stardock the success i guess against the piracy. Therefore i don´t understand this strategy.Personalize the patch downloads by watermarks and ur fine. Redistribution is prohibited - no need for impulse and the frustated customers.

In order to replace some files or apply changes to files itself, this can be done as well on other ways like steam or impulse. These technologies are pretty old and approved. The simpliest way is known from un*x since 198x.

my connection to the internet is through a evdo cell tower. i get around 30k per second download speeds. without impulse i woudln't be able to get these updates. i wasn't able to download the big patches because my connection isn't reliable enough. i'm out in bfe so getting a good connection would mean driving 20 miles to the city to find some internet cafe.

it is pretty easy to mark every one in this forum as pirate?!?! - if they are not happy how a company deals with valid and paying customers. A very short and easy view on it. I am software developer and belive me, i am no friend of pirates. Nevertheless buying some software and being forced to use a kind of drm tool in order to be able playing further online is not an acceptable way. This is what the customers complain here around.

Impluse as another option is pretty fine for everyone who wants to use it, but dont force it. Final Statement.

This discoussion is endless - for my own - i ll take care in the future and think twice if i buy further games of starbuck and partners.

You know, when Stardock provides me a guarantee that I can patch this game even if Stardock disappears, then I'll agree that complaining that you need to be registered and use the appropriate download manager has no merit except in very specific cases.

Until then though, regardless of whether you want to dismiss people as 'cranky' or not... I still think there's a legitimate concern here, even if the language used to express it might be a tad confrontational. *shrug* Unless people here truly believe that software is no longer a case of 'buying' but only 'renting'.

Edited to add: I'm not casting any aspersions upon Stardock's honesty here -- I'm just pointing out that stuff happens, regardless of intentions.

Blue Sky internet..........How true. About every third or fourth day Impulse cannot find a server and it can run like that all day (in Offline mode) You can start it and stop it many times (On/Off) Best answer so far has been a uninstalling impulse and reinstalling from the full download. After it updates itself it runs good for three or four more days.

99% of peeps who know how to keep their Win instalation clean and tight wont have any problem with Impulse...

You know, that's what everybody told me when I was trying to get Mass Effect to run. "Oh, since everybody else isn't having problems, you must be an idiot."

It's a great way to make friends, you know.

JGH [/quote]

Hanrow I totally agree with Nephilim and here's why: (quoting myself from a another similar thread)

I have no qualms about going on record saying the following:

1. All of my machines are running licensed, healthy copies of their respective OS's with consistently up-to-date-patch levels.

2. I haven't modified the OS's on said machines in any significant way. (ie. the OS on said machines is used to its fullest before anything else is ever installed)

3. I don't use "website guides" to disable OS functions which have been deemed "unecessary" by some gamer.

TIP : the descriptions posted for windows OS services are often not inclusive of ALL of the functions of said service. If you've begun disabling services based on those or "some gamer's" descriptions of the service please rethink your actions until you've actually educated yourself on the functions of same.

I believe, as a result of the above the following is true:

Save the few times the Impulse servers were having issues, I personally have never had one single issue with Impulse ever! Even when it first came out and I had to do some "work-arounds" (all of my home machines are also on an internal domain so certain things require a tad more administration )

I always have, and am still willing to keep helping people work through their issues. Please heed my advice and keep your OS's healthy, patched-up, and as un-modified as possible if you want to guarantee working third-party software.

These days I am Mac user but it took me fair few years to learn what you just wrote above... In fact since Windows 95... Now, I run XP via Bootcamp on my Mac... My XP installation is sooooooooo clean i cant actualy explain it to you how clean it is... I do NOT even have anti virus installed! Its vanilla as vanilla can be and it runs perfectly all my games...